


Death on the Beach

by Mycroffed



Category: Broadchurch
Genre: Be warned there will be mentions of blood, F/M, Human!Ellie Miller, New murder case, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Post-Season/Series 03, Supernatural - Freeform, Titles Suck, Vampire!Alec Hardy, and dead, everyone else is human
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-01
Updated: 2021-02-01
Packaged: 2021-03-18 16:15:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,070
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29121057
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mycroffed/pseuds/Mycroffed
Summary: A new body is discovered on the beach, seemingly killed by a vampire. But vampires aren't real, right?
Relationships: Alec Hardy & Ellie Miller, Alec Hardy/Ellie Miller
Comments: 8
Kudos: 27





	Death on the Beach

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! First of all, thank you for reading.
> 
> Broadchurch is a fandom I've been in for a while, but for some reason I still haven't written a fic for it. I have a lot of muse for this particular AU, and while I see a lot of art for it, I can't find a fic on vampire!Alec here. (Or I just can't use the search engine (: )
> 
> A quick warning: there are some mentions of su*cide at the beginning of the fic, though they are not said about a specific person. Apart from that, there's canon-typical mentions of blood, of a dead body, and the likes.
> 
> Hope you enjoy!

“Millah!”

The DS looked up as her name was yelled by her boss. Of course, this was not an unusual event anymore: just about every morning, Hardy stormed into the pen and called out her name. It was usually her sign to get up from her desk and join him in his office.

“Comin’.” She quickly closed the files that she’d been working on, then jumped up and rushed after him. She closed the door after her, then turned towards him.

She couldn’t help but notice how horrible he looked. They weren’t working a big case, yet he kept looking worse and worse every day. The bags under his eyes were becoming more noticeable, the paleness of his skin was getting more pronounced with every day that passed. It wasn’t that unusual that his clothes hung off him, that they were a little bit too big, but lately, they seemed like a size too big. It seemed like he was drowning in them.

“G’morning, sir,” she smiled, her usual kindness on display. “You look like …”

Hardy looked up from where he was sitting behind his desk, challenging her with one look to finish that sentence.

“You could use a cuppa.” Like death warmed over, she’d wanted to say, but she’d save that honestly for later. For when he properly pissed her off.

He rolled his eyes, before turning his attention back towards the screen. “So what’s been goin’ on out there?”

“Well, sir, not much. A few calls about some missin’ kettle, a breakin’ and enterin’, nothing we couldn’t handle.” She glanced over her shoulder towards the pen, her eyes scanning over the few people who were still sitting there, who hadn’t been sent out.

“Nothin’ big come in?” Hardy finally glanced away from the screen, and turned his attention fully towards her. A tingle ran down her spine, as if she liked that feeling of having his full attention.

“Nope. Not yet. But the day is still young, plenty o’ things can still happen.” She smiled, then took a seat on the sofa in Alec’s little office.

“Oh, so ye’re gettin’ comfortable in mah office now, huh?” His accent was strong and Scottish, but sometimes it seemed to waver a bit. There were days where it would be stronger, and days where it’d be less pronounced. She blamed it on him being in his head, but it might be something else.

“Where else would I go? Catchin’ up on the latest gossip out there gets boring after a while.” At that point, Ellie was sure that he could see a small smile twitch around her boss’ lips. Hah. He was having a good day, then.

Hardy opened his mouth, but at that moment, someone knocked on his office door. He glanced up, and Ellie turned around as much as she could in order to see who it was. It was DC Harford, her eyes completely focussed on the DI in the room. “Call came in, sir.”

There was a moment of silence, where both of them seemed to wait for Harford to continue. Eventually, it took a raise of Hardy’s eyebrow in order to achieve that.

“Body was found near the beach. Not that far from that suicide spot. Fifty-something man, found by a walker. Pretty sure it was a tourist.” A nod from Hardy, and she disappeared back into the pen.

“Ah, seems like yer prayers have been answered, Millah,” Hardy said, before pushing himself back onto his feet. “Ye’re drivin’.”

“As usual.” Ellie grinned. She got up as well and she immediately opened the door for the pair of them.

“Well, why change what works?”

She was pretty sure she got a second little smirk from him as he walked past her, grabbing his coat and draping it over himself. “Quite right, sir.”

She dashed to her desk in order to grab a few things herself, then dashed after Hardy again, who was for once waiting in the doorway. She shot him a grateful look, then made her way to her car. The silence while the pair of them walked was comfortable, it was something they had gotten used to. She’d chatter in the car, she’d speculate on the case, but he’d remain quiet until he had a plan.

So she unlocked the car, opened the door and got in. Hardy seemed to hesitate for a moment, then took a deep breath and joined her in his usual spot, the passenger’s seat. After starting the car, she glanced over at him. He was leaning away from her, resulting in quite an awkward position. She held back a scoff. Well, that was his loss, if he wanted to stay away from her, even after all those years, after everything they’d been through together.

“Think SOCO will already be there, sir?” She asked, mostly to fill the silence.

She didn’t get a response besides a breathless little grunt.

“Alright, don’t talk then.” She huffed, as she took a right, headed straight towards the cliffs and the beach. “Harford said the body was found on the beach, right? D’you think it’s a suicide?” She glanced over at Alec, hoping to see his reaction again.

Once again, she got not much more than a shrug and a grunt. Wonderful. The body seemed to have changed that decent mood into a right shitty one. Rather than try and continue to talk, she just drove on in silence, expecting that he’d talk if he were ready.

The advantage of a small town was that everything was close by: it took you maybe fifteen to twenty minutes to walk from one side of the town to the other, and just as much time to drive through most of the surrounding country. So fifteen minutes after they’d left the police station, Ellie parked the car as close to the beach as she could.

Hardy got out before she’d even secured the handbrake. (He wasn’t usually that impatient, a voice in the back of her head said.) “Right, Millah,” he said, as he suddenly got his ability for speech back. “New body, new case. While ye were grabbin’ stuff, I told Harford t’send SOCO over here, so they should be arrivin’ soon after us. First off, we should be lookin’ at any—”

“Anything out of the ordinary. This isn’t my first case, sir.” Ellie finished his sentence, then marched onto the beach.

“Right, well. After you, then,” Hardy seemed a little bit amused again and his moodswings were giving Ellie a whiplash.

After a minute or so of stomping through the sand, they found the body. Hardy reached it first, with those ridiculously long legs of his, and was already trying to get a first look at the victim. The moment he got close enough, Ellie could see the little amount of colour that remained on his face fade away.

“Millah, you stay back now.” He said, as he held a hand up towards her.

“Sir, this is my investigation as much as it is yours. I’m not goin’ to stay back.” She huffed, as she closed that little bit of remaining distance.

She knelt down the body, and the first thing she noticed were two puncture wounds, with lines of blood running down. Pfft, almost like a vampire had bitten them, she thought to herself. She pointed the wounds out to Hardy, however, since he probably wouldn’t be able to see them from where he was standing.

“Righ’, we’re steppin’ back until SOCO gets here. We’re at risk of contaminatin’ the body already.” Hardy set a prime example by stepping away himself, and then glanced at Ellie. When she didn’t move immediately, he raised his eyebrows, a gesture of his head accompanied by a ‘come on’.

So reluctantly, she got up, and walked over to where Hardy was standing. “Looks like a vampire did it, sir.” She said, mostly as a joke. She glanced over towards him, but his facial expression didn’t seem to change, almost as if he hadn’t heard her. So she repeated the sentence again, to make sure that he was aware of her. “Looks like a—”

“I heard ye the first time, Millah,” he said.

“Would’ve beat me,” she grumbled, before she glanced towards the parking near the beach. Where’s SOCO? Shouldn’t they be here by now?

“’s not a joke.” Hardy said quietly, and she would’ve missed it, had he not been standing downwind from where she was.

“What did you say?” Her full attention was on him, and she could see a little panicked look on his face. She’d startled him, which meant that she was not supposed to hear that.

“Nothin’.” He said, as he carefully regained control over his expression.

“What do you mean, ‘s not a joke’?” She tried to mimic his accent as best she could, to make it clear that she’d known very well who had spoken.

“Ye mention vampires, an’ I’m merely sayin’ that they’re not a joke.” Hardy said, a little bit louder this time.

“Sir. Next you’re going to tell me that vampires exist.” She scoffed, but her eyes never quite leave her boss’ face. There was no reaction, which only made her feel that she’d hit the nail on the head. “I mean, vampires? You read about those in books and see them in movies.”

“Ye also see divorces an’ humans in movies, does that mean that _they’re_ not real?” Hardy’s eyes were hyper focused on that body, as if he was just waiting for it to move. (Impossible, Ellie told herself.)

“Well, no. But they’re humans. Vampires are creatures from horror books, from horror movies.” Ellie protested.

“Well—” Hardy finally glanced in her direction, and she could see that he was serious.

“Sir—” She couldn’t believe it. Rational, logic Alec Hardy believed that vampires were real. He was actually going to use this as a proper option in this case. She shook her head, scoffed, then turned her attention away from him. “That’s not possible.”

“Those who don’t believe in magic will never find it.” Hardy said.

“You did _not_ just quote Roald Dahl at me like it’s the most normal thing to do, sir.” She huffed. “’Sides, how would you even know about vampires?”

He didn’t answer that, but his eyes seemed to be burning holes inside her forehead. She swallowed nervously, then glanced away. But it made her think: how _could_ he possibly know about vampires? It wasn’t as if he’d gotten a note in the post, telling him that vampires were real, that they were the way to go. Right? He couldn’t possibly have. Another option, much more ridiculous than the first one: he had experience with them. A family member murdered, or turned, or something ridiculous. The last option she could think of was that he was a vampire himself.

But that wasn’t possible. Alec was about as human as they come.

 _Unless_ , her treacherous mind whispered. When had she actually seen him eat? Or drink? When she made him, sure, but besides that, he’d always turned down any offer to eat. He could walk in the sun, evidently, but he did have a tendency to cover himself up with a full suit, even during the summer months. Whenever they’d wanted to meet the reverend Paul, they’d met _outside_ of the church. As if he couldn’t be inside it. And had he ever slept? Not that she was aware of. The only time that they’d shared a room, he’d gone to sleep and woken up after and before she had.

_It just didn’t fit._

As she glanced back towards her boss, her eyes scanned his face: the dark bags under his eyes, the carefully crafted expression on his face, the paleness of his skin. “Sir—” she started, but she didn’t know where that sentence was going.

“Spit it out, Millah. SOCO is goin’ t’be here soon.” Hardy glanced at her, and for a moment, she was sure that his eyes turned blood-red.

“How d’you know vampires are real?” She asked again.

“Ye already know the answer to that question,” he said softly. “Ye just have to dare t’say it.”

“Oh god,” she stepped back from him, as a surprising wave of fear washed all over her. She shouldn’t be ridiculous, this was Hardy, a man she’d visited in hospital after one of the worst asthma attacks she’d ever witnessed, a man who she’d shared a bed with, a man who she’d worked in such close quarters with that he could have killed her easily and nobody would’ve known.

“I’m not gonna kill ye,” Hardy said softly, though she noticed that he didn’t take a step closer to her. He allowed her her space. “I haven’t drank from humans in a _long_ time.”

“Oh _god_ ,” she repeated herself, taking another step back as one of her hands covered her mouth. “But it’s impossible, I—you were in the hospital, you—”

“Lung problems. Vampires don’t really have the ‘perfect body’ like they want ye t’believe.” Hardy explained. “Every once in a while, my body forgets it doesn’t need to breathe.”

This was impossible. It kept coming back to that, wasn’t it? Ellie needed some more time to wrap her head around this, and it seemed that Hardy acknowledged that.

“Keep yer questions t’yerself for now,” he suggested. “An’ once we’re sure we’ve got everythin’ we can from the scene, we’ll leave SOCO to it an’ I’ll answer all questions ye have.”

Ellie nodded nervously, but made sure to keep some distance between the pair of them. She wasn’t quite sure whether she still trusted him or not.

“I won’t hurt ye, Millah,” he said softly, his voice soft and gentle, like it had been when he’d helped her process what Joe had done. “I would never forgive myself if I hurt ye.”

It seemed like she was saved by SOCO, because after that, the team arrived, secured the scene and got to work. Ellie took that opportunity to step away from the crime scene, and left Hardy to deal with Brian and the findings. She mumbled some excuse of going to the top of the cliff to see whether they had a scene there as well, knowing that the walk up there would help clear her mind.

Her body was working on autopilot since she’d walked that bath upwards so many time. It was quite a climb, but still manageable. Her mind, however, was racing all over the place. If vampires were real, then what else was real? Did they have a werewolf on the team? Or a fairy? She could already hear Hardy scoff _‘Don’t be ridiculous, Millah’_ , but then again, she’d been sure she would’ve said the same if she’d thought about vampires a few hours back.

It certainly did explain a few things about the man she knew as Alec Hardy: it explained why his accent came and went sometimes, it explained why he seemed to be awake at all times, it explained why he never ate—

Her eyes darted in the direction of the found body, of _Hardy_ , but her view was obscured by the cliff she was climbing. Could he possibly be in need of blood? Was that why he had been looking more and more like shit? That certainly was one of the questions she’d have to ask.

When she finally reached the top of the cliff, she was met by Jameson, one of the SOCO team members. He raised a hand towards her as a greeting, and she put on a smile as if her world didn’t seem to be crumbling around her. Again. But for a completely different reason, this time, luckily enough. “So what have you found here?”

“We’ve found signs of a struggle, which suggest that the victim didn’t jump,” Jameson explained. There were more points that he made, but she could see Hardy from there, and she couldn’t help but stare at him as he interacted with Brian. “—But we’re looking for footprints still.”

“Sounds like good news.” She said, clearly absentminded. “Well, good news for us, at least we know that there’s someone who’s responsible for this. And this means that we’ll be able to catch said—person.”

“Right. Well, it’s going to take us a while to probably get through both scenes, so there’ll definitely be a report—” Ellie was vaguely aware that Jameson was still talking, but her eyes had never left the figure of Hardy at the bottom of the cliff. And then suddenly, he glanced up at her. She could _feel_ his gaze on her.

A shiver ran down her spine and her heartbeat sped up considerably. So she stepped back, out of sight from her boss, and let out a sigh of relief.

“Any more questions, ma’am?” Jameson asked, seemingly not for the first time.

“Ah, uh. No. I’ll be waitin’ for that report that you’ve promised.” She managed a charming little smile, and then dashed away from that crime scene, all the way down the path along the cliff. Fuck. _Fuck_ , fuck, fuck, fuck, _fuck_. Why did a look from that far away make her heart race like she was a teenager again? Especially _after_ he’d just told her that he was a bloody vampire?

She made her way back to the car, waiting for Hardy to return so that they could have that particular conversation that he’d promised her. She locked the doors, mostly out of habit than anything else, and stared at the steering wheel. _Fuck_ , she thought again, before she let herself fall forwards, her forehead hitting the horn of the car.

One loud sound broke the silence inside the vehicle.

“Fuck,” she cursed quietly under her breath, before she sat up again. She leaned her head against the headrest and closed her eyes as she tried to come up with a few of those questions for her (apparently) vampire boss.

She was snapped out of thoughts by someone trying to open the door, then tapping on the window. Ellie jumped a little where she was, then glanced over and realised that it was just Hardy. She opened the door from the inside, and watched as Hardy got into the car.

“Right,” he said, the moment that he’d gotten comfortable. “I s’pose that ye’ve got a lot of questions for me.”

Ellie hesitated for a moment, but eventually managed a little nod.

“Let’s get started, then.”

**Author's Note:**

> For now, I'm gonna leave it here. I'll probably end up writing more, but that'll be a rather impromptu and improvised sequel if I do. I liked the idea of it raising more questions.
> 
> A few explanations: the heart of a vampire doesn't beat, but I still wanted a physical consequence to Alec not looking after himself, so I gave him a lung problem. If I ever write a sequel to this, it'll be properly explained there.
> 
> I'm keeping most of the canon of the first and third series, and while the Sandbrook case definitely happened and definitely haunted Alec, Tess and Daisy are not characters linked to that. Don't worry, Alec was still a father and a husband at some point, but that also would get explained in this potential sequel.
> 
> Kudos, comments and bookmarks make my day every time. Thank you for reading!


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